The disputed notion of sacramentality in Anglican Eucharistic theology: Multiformity of philosophical assumptions

For many Anglicans a sacramentality based on realist incarnational assumptions is at the centre of their eucharistic theology. For other Anglicans, affirming nominalist assumptions, sacramentality has a limited role. This multiformity of assumptions places sacramentality in dispute in Anglicanism. For the realist there is an inherent sacramentality or moderate realism, where signs (such as bread and wine) effectively and really convey the signified reality. For realists the bread and wine of the Eucharist are as much the carrier of Christ’s life and identity as his literal body and blood. For the nominalist there is no real link between the sign and the signified and so the issue of sacramentality is less important or completely denied. Signs for the nominalist function as reminders only of a past and completed transaction (Christ’s death at a point in history) and do not convey any present signified reality outside the enquiring mind.